Not quite sure whether there needs to be depth to the notebooks or not (a Talking Heads line " what good are notebooks " comes to mind, I think it is from Life During Wartime ). At first the note seemed shallow :

notes from the .. wrote:

Knowledge for me, apparently, was a useful way to cheat others of their money.

but then you might think what else is there to be done with knowledge or even what the heck is knowledge, anyhow? The genie deal is another stretch, sort of an answer in the form of a question ...

Yep, Joni Mitchell songs are hardly being written anymore; but they definitely are